Some have tried to pin the tail on the donkey by discrediting cooperation in externals, insisting that the preservation of our confession was justification for refusing such cooperation in externals. Others, especially those within progressive or liberal churches, believe that if the witness gets in the way of the confession, the confession must bend. Typically, however, the progressive wing will cooperate with anyone about anything while the conservatives are seen as the impediments to such mercy work. There may have been a time when that was correct but it is not now. Now it is more likely that the progressives will have litmus tests for the partnered work and these tests tend to be about the preservation of the holy grail of LGBTQ+ rights and protections along with the other liberal causes such as climate change, social justice, and advocacy over the actual provision of goods and services. Add to that the political nature of this work and the NGO status of most of the agencies doing it and you have a recipe for trouble.
The reality is that most conservative Christian churches would be glad to cooperate if their noses were not held to the grind wheel of sexual practice, gender identity, global warming, political advocacy, and work that comes on the government dime. In effect, the progressive churches have substituted the preservation of these stands and causes for doctrinal ones. The ELCA is certainly more interested in shared communion with those who believe nothing is really there to be received in the Sacrament than they are talks with Missouri who believe the Real Presence instead of the real absence but it is equally true that the ELCA is more interested in doing just about anything with anyone so long as the sacred tenets of sexual freedom, gender identity, climate change, and social justice are preserved. That translates into a truth (at least how they would express it) more important and more essential than God's own truth about who He is and what He has done for us. In this respect, we are at an impasse. The progressives do not want to work with anyone who will not affirm their unscriptural beliefs and the conservatives do not want to work with anyone who will not respect their Scriptural ones. Maybe at one point in time the conservatives were the problem in the area of cooperation in externals but today the progressives have made it impossible for us to work with them even opening a can of soup without wearing a rainbow flag on our lapels.
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In areas of human needs, It would be better for the LCMS to work alone or contribute to a secular charity than to join with ELCA, which would give the appearance to the world that the two bodies share a similar theology or that there is neutrality and tolerance of progressive ideas.
"The reality is that most conservative Christian churches would be glad to cooperate if their noses were not held to the grind wheel of sexual practice, gender identity, global warming, political advocacy, and work that comes on the government dime."
One hopes that LCMS leadership has finally learned that lesson after they have repeatedly ended up with scraped and bloodied noses after ignoring that reality.
Embedded in the issue of "cooperation [with others] in externals" by Lutheran (or other) religious organizations is the question of "What is religion?" Lutherans should have an answer ready.
In his April 24, 2024, \i{Federalist} article, "With Wisconsin Case, It’s Time For SCOTUS To Finally Define ‘Religion’" (https://thefederalist.com/2025/04/24/with-wisconsin-case-its-time-for-scotus-to-finally-define-religion/), Tyler Cochran wrote, in part:
"Late last month, the Supreme Court held oral arguments on a case that looks at what behavior counts as religious activity. The court seems poised to overturn Wisconsin’s absurd decision that self-giving acts of charity are not religious activity. But the court also has the chance to prevent such sins against religious liberty from happening to begin with if only it will define religion under the First Amendment...
"Without a definition of religion, courts are forced to guess at what activities mandate protection from government interference. This guesswork often results in judgments that do little more than make distinctions based on what looks religious rather than what is religious. With religious discrimination surging to all-time highs, religious people need their protections grounded in something more substantive than the subjective assessment of individual judges. They need the protections promised by the First Amendment....
"The Supreme Court has many definitions to choose from. The justices could adopt a purely theistic definition. Or a subjective definition grounded in personal convictions that could even recognize atheism as deserving of free exercise protections. Or even still, the Supreme Court could adopt a mixed definition — in some contexts religion would mean something broad akin to a subjective definition, and in others it would mean something narrow, more in line with a traditional theistic definition.
"However, the definition the court should adopt is that which best reflects the original meaning and is adaptable to a changing religious landscape: namely, religion means a system of beliefs and practices derived from duties to a sacred authority, which is prior to and beyond human relations and receives allegiance and worship."
My concern is that since, according to the First Amendment ("Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion , or prohibiting the free exercise thereof") any SCOTUS majority definition of religion would not be based on any existing law respecting religion, and thereby would be questionable, if not extraconstitutional. Of course, the SCOTUS majority had no qualms about redefining "marriage". Thus one might expect, given the behavior of numerous justices, that the SCOTUS might define what "religion" is (and is not), or even reverse the definitions of "up" and "down".
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